Therefore do not fear them, for there is nothing concealed that will not be revealed, or hidden that will not be known.
So Serena walks into class late & makes the remark “My dad sent me a box with a banana in it. You don’t send someone a banana in the mail, it’s a really bad idea” & people laugh & give a few moments to rest in absurdity & then class continues. & I jot this down in my composition book & I realize that this is all so Errol Morris, this angle, this statement, this reality. But this Errol Morris is the Morris I loved to watch, the eccentric absurdities of the turkey hunter, the sad poolside ironies of the lost son, the absurd that is only made absurd through its reality. This is not the same absurdity exhibited in Fast Cheap, which is an absurdity that exists only as a product of the fact that the subjects are chosen purposely & precisely for their absurd nature. Morris can say he doesn’t make his subjects look ridiculous, but he does choose them & he does choose which shots of them to produce, & in the case of Fast Cheap, he is creating the absurdity. It is a manufactured, postured realism, one that doesn’t seem real because it’s so over-cooked.
In linguistics class Professor Kakava says “I breathe language” & I jot this down, too, right under Serena’s story about her banana, but it doesn’t mirror the same feeling as the banana, it’s hardly in the same realm at all. This is a truth, a truth entrenched in a life well spent, a truth that does manage to shine through in Fast Cheap; this is still Errol Morris. There are reflections of life constantly in collages in what can be thought to be true life after all. The collages in Morris’ earlier movies are true life collages, pieced together with the natural magic of camera, not with editing techniques or cheesy “Interrotron” inventions. They are fast, cheap, & truly out of control, the irony here being that Fast Cheap & Out of Control is anything but. Save a few bucks, save some time, experience true life & see real people without makeup, without lighting, only with life. Vernon is about as neo-realistic as you can get, I’ll pump that movie up over Fast Cheap as long as I can.